1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to ink jet and, more particularly, to ink jet systems employing conductive ink.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In recent years, substantial effort has been directed toward designing nonimpact printing systems potentially having relatively high resolution and relatively high printing speeds. Electrostatic ink jet is such a nonimpact printing system, and significant effort has been focused on achieving high resolution and achieving high speed.
High resolution requires fine nozzles and fine drop charging and deflection structures to form and control small drops. The inks usually employed in such systems are corrosive in nature as well as conductive. Thus, any partial clogging or fouling of a nozzle resulting in misdirection of the jet may ultimately cause substantial electrical shorting and cause corrosion of delicate parts.
A way of increasing the printing speed of ink jet systems is to employ multiple nozzles and multiple charge electrodes, all closely spaced with respect to one another. With large numbers of closely spaced and delicate electrodes and nozzles, the partial clogging or fouling of a single nozzle may cause damaging interactions with other nozzles and electrodes. Such potentially damaging interactions may result in destruction in the usefulness of an entire multi-nozzle ink jet head.
Prior efforts have concentrated on perfection of the ink jet nozzles, upon perfection of the ink's chemical composition, and upon perfection of ink filtration systems to thereby attempt to prevent any clogging or fouling of the ink jet nozzles. It may be that such perfection is not truly attainable in the machine production environment.